


How Beautiful the Night

by childrenofthesun



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vampire, Happy Ending, M/M, Vampire Crowley (Good Omens)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-16
Updated: 2020-11-16
Packaged: 2021-03-10 07:40:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,093
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27589661
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/childrenofthesun/pseuds/childrenofthesun
Summary: Fog curled around the polished toes of Crowley's shoes, seemingly seeking to keep him earthbound even as he hauled himself up onto the stone wall surrounding the cemetery. The damp air smothered any sound he might make, and there was barely a muted thud as he landed on the other side.He made his way to the same spot he always did, coming to a halt before a simple, arched slab of stone bearing little more than a name and a date. The other headstones loomed pale in the mist behind him, like the ghosts of those buried beneath them.The grave that Crowley stood over was empty.It was his own.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 21
Kudos: 106
Collections: ABSFZ Halloween Good Omens Works





	How Beautiful the Night

**Author's Note:**

> This was my entry to the A Big Spooky Fanzine! I'd only intended to create a piece of art for the zine, then the next thing I knew I'd also produced a 2,000 word fic to go along with it. Honestly, I am surprised it took me this long to do something with vampire Crowley, I had a lot of fun with this piece. Hope you all enjoy!

Fog curled around the polished toes of Crowley's shoes, seemingly seeking to keep him earthbound even as he hauled himself up onto the stone wall surrounding the cemetery. The damp air smothered any sound he might make, and there was barely a muted thud as he landed on the other side.

He made his way to the same spot he always did, coming to a halt before a simple, arched slab of stone bearing little more than a name and a date. The other headstones loomed pale in the mist behind him, like the ghosts of those buried beneath them.

The grave that Crowley stood over was empty.

It was his own.

He'd never actually been _in_ his grave; that was at least one small mercy, that he hadn't woken to find himself trapped in a silk-lined prison. He hadn't had to pry open his coffin from the inside, bloodied fingers clawing at the dirt as it tried to fill his lungs, leaving him retching and gasping when he finally broke free of the ground.

No, he'd simply been dragged off and turned by vampires, and his family had buried a coffin weighted down with rocks rather than admit the truth. Crowley had already been enough of a black sheep when he'd still been human, after all, they couldn't have him continuing to besmirch the family name after he'd died.

Crowley would have had the last laugh about it, if he hadn't been quite so melancholy, given that none of his brothers or sisters had produced heirs that had reached adulthood. His family line had died out decades ago, and their precious reputation with them.

Not that Crowley's personal leanings would have been conducive to furthering his lineage, had his human life not been cut short.

He sighed, dragging his eyes away from the familiar shape of his own headstone, and out across the neat rows of the cemetery. He'd watched it sprawl and grow over the decades, sandstone and slate slowly encroached upon by marble as the cemetery filled itself with everyone he'd ever known.

Bar one.

He still made a habit of it, on occasion, half-heartedly scanning the chiselled stones for Ezra's name. Realistically, he knew Ezra would had to have passed quite some time ago, and if he'd been buried here, Crowley would have found his grave by now. The most reasonable explanation was that he had moved away, and was buried elsewhere. It did nothing to stop Crowley from searching, though, even as he hoped irrationally that Ezra might have been blessed with a peculiarly long lifespan, that Crowley might have the chance to see him one last time.

Deep down, he knew he didn't want that. To find Ezra with the long shadow of death looming over him, to have the bright, soft memory of the man he'd loved wither to something gaunt and frail.

That still didn't stop him from yearning. From wishing he'd had more time, more courage, more Ezra.

A brisk wind picked up, tugging at his hair as it rustled through the grass, whistling mournfully between the masses of stone. The scattering of clouds that had been covering the moon briefly scudded to the side, bathing the cemetery in cold silver light. Crowley nestled a little deeper into his coat, the starched collar of his shirt digging into his chin. He looked down at his grave again, then frowned as he caught sight of something he hadn't noticed before.

A small bundle of blooms had been placed gently at the base of his headstone, petals curling in close to the bud to ward off the cold autumn air.

It wasn't the first time he'd found flowers on his grave. Crowley rather imagined that it was someone that visited the cemetery for their own dead family members, and had taken pity on his lonely grave, surrounded on all sides by unrelated couples and families as it was. There was a Crowley family crypt on the other side of the cemetery, currently hidden by the mist. Crowley scowled in its general direction. His parents had decided he hadn't proved himself worthy of being entombed in his ancestral burial ground, and had instead shunted him off to a far cheaper plot, reserving his space in the crypt for someone whose body would actually be buried there.

Truth be told, though, he was glad that his coffin hadn't been put in the family crypt. Out here, he could still see the stars, and the moon, the closest thing to sunlight he could get without burning.

Another thick cloud drifted over the moon, plunging the cemetery into darkness. Crowley sighed, deciding that he'd lamented the missed opportunities of his human existence for long enough. He began wending his way back through the headstones in order to leave, only to find that, inexplicably, there was someone else in the cemetery with him.

Who in the blazes would venture into a cemetery in the dead of night? It couldn't possibly be a local, they were all far too superstitious for that – and Crowley was unliving proof that their fears were well-founded. And what out-of-towner could possibly want to go stumbling through a random burial ground at the witching hour?

The man looked to be a few inches shorter than Crowley, and far softer around the middle, his pale overcoat a stark contrast to the dark of Crowley's own clothing. Crowley must have made some sort of noise, because the man suddenly gave a startled little hop, whirling around and letting Crowley see him properly.

If Crowley had still needed to breathe, he surely would have stopped then.

The man had gentle eyes set in a round face, surrounded by an unmistakable halo of cherubic blond curls, no less distinctive for the fact that it was a visage Crowley hadn't looked upon in over half a century.

And, even if there had been any doubt left in his mind, soft pink lips parted and whispered, "Anthony..."

"Ezra," he choked out in response, realising far too late that speaking would expose the long, inhuman points of his canines. Ezra's eyes flicked to his mouth, widened, and filled with anguish as he began to back away.

"Ezra, wait!" Crowley called out desperately, and gave chase. Ezra turned fully and began to sprint between the headstones. Crowley cursed under his breath and picked up the pace, refusing to let Ezra slip through his fingers a second time.

Crowley caught Ezra just as they reached the wall, fingers snagging in his coat and spinning him around. Ezra let Crowley seize him by the lapels and press him up against the wall, hands limp and defeated by his sides. He radiated heat like a furnace. Crowley wanted to bury in close and never let him go.

"I'm not going to hurt you," he promised, hating the fear he could see shining in those beloved eyes. God, Crowley had thought he'd never see him again.

Something in Ezra's face softened, even without losing his air of weary defeat. "Of course you wouldn't, I know you far too well to ever believe you would."

Crowley relaxed his death grip a little. Ezra obviously still loved him, at least that much hadn't changed. Nor had the rest of him, come to think of it, Ezra didn't look much older than the last time Crowley had seen him.

Which had been decades ago.

Which meant that he couldn't possibly be human anymore, either–

Ezra cleared his throat. "So, you're a... a vampire."

"Er. Yes. Figured you might have noticed that."

"I'd heard the rumours, when you were... gone, but I didn't actually think..." He trailed off, blinking rapidly and looking down as his face flooded with shame. "If I'd known, I swear I would have searched for you." He paused again, taking a shaky breath. "Perhaps then, I wouldn't have..."

"You couldn't have known," Crowley reassured, clutching him tighter. "My parents were the only ones who saw what happened, and they would have rather thought me dead than admit what I'd become." He let go of Ezra's lapels to cradle his face instead. Heat bloomed from Ezra's skin, and Crowley drank it in, a headier thrill than any time he'd hunted. "It's all right, I don't blame you one bit." A smile suddenly pulled at his lips, so wide it made his cheeks ache. "Do you realise what this means?" he said excitedly. Ezra gave him a nervous look. Undeterred, Crowley smiled even wider, feeling it in his teeth. "We can be together now, properly. No more disapproving families. No more frantic, stolen moments. We can have everything, just the way we always wanted."

"We can't," Ezra choked out, eyes crushed shut as he shook his head. " _I_ can't."

Crowley's smile dimmed, feeling like someone had just punched him in the gut. "You've met someone else."

He was a fool. Ezra had thought he'd died decades ago, of course he'd moved on since then. 

But Ezra shook his head again, lifting his hands to curl them around Crowley's wrists, gently holding him. "No, no I haven't. It's only ever been you."

"Then I don't understand what the problem is. It'd be different if you were human still, obviously, but you're not, you're like me–"

"Anthony, you don't understand! _I'm not like you_."

Ezra stared up at him, tears gleaming in his eyes. Then the clouds covering the silver disc of the moon slipped to the side, and a ripple went through Ezra's skin. Pale fur suddenly curled along his jawline, over the backs of his hands, his manicured nails elongating into thick claws.

The tears spilt over and soaked into his fur. "I didn't want you to find out like this," he whispered, voice deepening as his face elongated into a muzzle. "I didn't want you to see. I wanted you to remember me as I was."

Crowley didn't let go of Ezra's face, fingers buried deep in fur far softer than he'd expected it to be.

This _did_ change things.

His coven might have abided by his periodic little graveyard trips, and they likely wouldn't have cared who he fraternised with, so long as they were also a vampire.

Which, clearly, Ezra wasn't. Worse, he was a werewolf, meaning that the man he loved was now supposed to be his hereditary enemy. Crowley didn't know where Ezra's pack would stand on that sort of thing – if he even had a pack to begin with, although given his reactions so far, Crowley figured it was a safe assumption – but he somehow doubted they'd take too kindly to Ezra getting friendly with a vampire, either.

They _still_ couldn't be together freely, the way they'd always dreamt of.

But the prospect of having Ezra simply vanish from his life again…

"I don't care," Crowley decided.

"Pardon?" Ezra replied, startled by the suddenness with which Crowley had spoken.

"I don't care what you are, or what I am. I've already spent more of my existence without you than with you. I can't begin to tell you how sad that makes me."

Ezra wavered, his wide blue eyes conflicted. "Anthony, I don't know that…"

"I love you," Crowley said fiercely. Clouds covered the moon once more, and Ezra shuddered as his human features reasserted themselves, fur and claws receding back into skin. "We can make it work, we can meet right here – no one else ever comes to the cemetery this late at night, you're the first person I've ever seen here after dark. Nobody will even notice us." Crowley took his hands and squeezed, drawing his thumbs over Ezra's knuckles. "Please, Ezra, you're worth the risk, to me."

Ezra's chin wobbled, a war raging on in his eyes. Crowley felt his doubts and fears multiplying, the possibility that he might lose Ezra all over again bearing down and threatening to crush him.

"Please," Crowley whispered, voice cracking.

Ezra let go of his hands.

Crowley had only a moment of knee-weakening despair, however, before Ezra grabbed him by the waistcoat and hauled him into an inelegant kiss. Crowley melted into it immediately, sinking into the heat of Ezra's touch, pressing him against the wall. Ezra tasted just as he remembered, and Crowley was instantly addicted once more.

They only broke apart when the moon made another intermittent appearance, Crowley resting his forehead against Ezra's cheek, feeling warm breath grazing his neck.

"I'll take that as a yes?" Crowley asked cautiously, not lifting his head.

Ezra chuckled fondly against his ear. "For you, my dear, always."


End file.
